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An adhesively bonded structure consists of two substrates, an adhesive, and two interfaces. When loaded to failure, a bonded structure will fail in the weakest component; the first step in determining why a bond has failed is to determine, at a molecular level, where it failed: which of these components was the weak link in the chain? Many times visual inspection won’t tell you. A failure that looks interfacial to the eye may have actually failed in a very thin layer of the adhesive or the substrate. Want to learn more? Contact us.

Reliability equates to reproducibility: reproducibility of the materials used and the processes used to prepare their surfaces. The surface preparation process must create a surface with the same molecular level composition every time. Wetting measurements using the Surface Analyst™ are exquisitely sensitive to the molecular composition of a surface and help ensure reproducibility of surfaces prepared for adhesive bonding or coating. Want to learn more? Contact us.

For the purpose of bonding operations, contamination is any substance that interferes with the ability of the adhesive or coating to intimately contact the substrate. There doesn’t have to be much of it: certain contaminants (like mold releases) can disrupt a bond when there is only a single molecular layer present. Contact angle measurements made using the Surface Analyst™ are determined by this same uppermost molecular layer and are a quantitative function of the amount and type of contaminant. A three second measurement shows immediately if a surface is out of specification due to the presence of contamination. The Surface Analyst is the best tool for understanding surface properties in a manufacturing and repair environments. Want to learn more? Contact us.